Justice F.

August 2011
Etsy prides itself on specializing in hand crafted items and true vintage items but Etsy staff will just close down your store arbitrarily without reason.

I've been selling on Etsy for almost 2 years when all of sudden, they closed my shop without notice. Apparently, someone thought my items weren't vintage, but they are real vintage, and I have documents to prove so. But Etsy staff didn't ask me. They just closed my shop because one person thought differently. I don't know who that person is, whether Etsy member or an Etsy staff.

Regardless, I've talked to other Etsy sellers about this, and apparently it's very common. Etsy will abruptly close your shop without cause or notice. Extremely frustrating if you're a seller.

More frustrating is, there are tons of new items, be it designer handbags like Tory Burch or cheap made in China stuff that you see on eBay, but those sellers are allowed to stay (because those new items get sold quickly on Etsy in mass quantities, which means Etsy makes money off of them) while true vintage sellers get pushed to the side.

Where's the justice in that?

And good luck if you're a buyer and don't receive your items. Etsy doesn't want to get involved in buyer-seller disputes, so they make you duke it out with the seller directly. This means you can't call Etsy customer service to complain (phone number was un-listed for a long time and now that people know Etsy's phone number, they don't answer it). And you could email Etsy for help, but they don't respond. You just get the automated response..."we'll invesitgate this further." But nothing happens.

ETSY IS BAD FOR BOTH SELLER AND BUYERS